Lady (17 page)

Lew, Harry, and I felt that Aggie, with her shyness and blushes, was going to be the class wallflower, and that we would have to bribe someone to ask her to dance. And though we tried, we failed, and it was Ag herself who brought it off, beautifully. Our dancing teacher, Miss Lee (beautiful Miss Lee!), drove down each Friday night from Hartford, with a piano player named Gus, to the Masonic Hall where she set up shop, Gus at the piano on the stage, Miss Lee in a long evening dress (practically a different one each week), and the boys on one side, girls on the other. I was that year wearing a salt-and-pepper tweed knicker suit of Lew's, six years old and itchy, but it was the best that could be managed for these Friday-night sessions. Miss Lee had promised that by Christmas we would be doing the rumba the way they did it at the Rainbow Room in Radio City, but before any rumbas there was the inevitable grand march around the room to the strains of "When the Saints Go Marching In," then the rush to choose a partner, then the painful process of learning the basic one-two steps, and fumbling our way into the simple rhythms Gus had devised for us. I always made a beeline for Cookie Bunder, who was big and jolly, and was willing to take me off to a corner and give me private instruction.

Meanwhile, there was the problem of Ag. As soon as the time approached when boys got to choose girls, we looked around, trying to decide who would take on our sister. Our choice lit on that paragon, Gerald Morrisey, who we figured would be just the ticket to push Ag around the hall in return for a consideration. But when the time came, the plan backfired. Gerald took the bribe all right, and pocketed it, but, having gotten it, he now retired to the washroom where he proceeded to splat his pimples on the mirror and wouldn't come out. As with Krazy Kat, feckless was the word for Gerald Morrisey. And there was Ag, sitting at the end of the row under an arrangement of artificial gladioli, twisting her gloves into rags, the plastic pocketbook I'd given her for her birthday clasped in her lap, and her brown school shoes scuffed like mule saddle.

She turned scarlet when Miss Lee brought Gerald, the only remaining unpaired male, from the washroom, and waited until he had proposed his invitation. Ag rose; Miss Lee walked to the center of the hall; Gerald simpered; Ag sat again; the music began. Round and round went the class, while Ag, still blushing, ducked her head, refusing to look at perfidious Gerald, who was fidgeting as if he needed to go to the bathroom he'd only just quitted.

Then a group appeared in the doorway of the vestibule: Lady and Colonel Blatchley, and Jesse, liveried and standing in the background. I went dancing by with Cookie Bunder, and we both smiled as we passed; but Lady's glance was not on us but on Ag. Lady had a quick word with the Colonel, then slipped off her fur coat, which Jesse stepped up and took, and together she and the Colonel walked to the end of the hall, where Lady whisked Gerald onto the floor with the other dancers while Colonel Blatchley, with a debonair bow, persuasively took Ag's hand and led her out. Her face was still red and she hung her head so her hair hid it, but he raised her chin, making a joke that caused her to laugh in spite of herself, and as she laughed he took her in his arms and began dancing with her. I stopped pushing Cookie around, riveted by the sight because, wonder of wonders, old Ag could actually dance! And thereby lay the explanation of the strange noises from her bedroom: she had been practicing the fox-trot with a chair, until frustration drove her over to Lady, who would show her the correct way to do it.

After class we usually spread out in the drugstore for a soda, because, it being Friday night, Mr. Keller kept open till eleven, and when he closed, Constable Keep patrolled the street in his tin lizzy until the last of us had gone to our houses.

One night when we went to the drugstore, I escorted Cookie Bunder, Lew was with Jack and Phil Harrelson's older sister, Marge, while
Hairy
sat in a booth in the corner with a bunch of stags. Cookie ordered a lemon phosphate, and I had my usual root-beer float, and we all said hello to Blue Ferguson as he came in and went to the back of the store. Mr. Keller provided him with purchases unseen, the cash register rang, Blue gave us his "Blue look," and went out. Seconds later the door opened again, letting in another blast of cold air. I stared at the customer who'd come in. Even with his back to me, I knew immediately who it was. I darted a signal to Lew, who leaned across the table and I whispered the name in his ear.

"Ott."

Lew tossed a sugar cube into the corner booth to attract Harry's attention, and we all three cautiously observed the man. Above the babble of soda drinkers and sundae eaters, it was impossible to hear what he was saying to Mr. Keller, but the druggist came around the counter to the rack where chewing gum and life savers were displayed. Mr. Ott bought cough drops. Opening the flap of the box, he put a lozenge into his mouth. Harry had extricated himself from the corner and was standing behind Lew, and I held my breath when the man came in a straight line toward us as if he intended speaking. In one hand he carried the battered briefcase I had seen before. His expression was bland, and he made sucking motions with his mouth, his cheeks pulled in, his white lips pursed into an ugly little pocket.

At the last minute, he changed his direction and went out. Lew jumped to his feet and ran to the door, peering through the glass. Harry went behind him, and I behind Harry, all of us looking. Cookie broke off her conversation with Marge Harrelson and demanded to know what was going on anyway?

Out on the street Mr. Ott put another cough drop into his mouth and slipped the box into his coat pocket. He hefted the briefcase once or twice, and stood looking up at the church clock. I was sure he would go off toward the Green, and planned on following him to Lady's house, but when he moved it was in the opposite direction, to the trolley stop in front of the Masonic Hall. He stood under the street lamp, lit a cigarette, waited. When the trolley came along from Talcottville, it stopped and he got on, swinging the briefcase aboard ahead of him. The door shut, the car started up. We stepped out to watch as it gathered speed, rocking as it grew smaller along the track, and the tip of the discarded cigarette glowed as it spun through the lighted window into the darkness.

Again the old questions arose. Why had he come? What did he want here? What was in the briefcase he hugged so importantly? Why was he frightening Lady? How I hated him, that red-haired man. Hated the thought of him, hated his existence, hated the pale freckled face, the red rabbity eyebrows. We pondered the mystery all week, discussing it only in fragmented conversations, and never mentioning it to anyone else. At night I lay awake imagining a confrontation, what I would say to him, and what I would do. And I secretly resolved that I was finally going to bring Mr. Ott's case before Jesse.

This came about one day when Jesse had taken us out hunting in Hubbard's woods. Rabbit Hornaday was along, and Lew and Harry with their air rifles. While they prowled on ahead, the ping of their BB guns occasionally sounding through the woods, and while Rabbit drifted off somewhere with the slingshot he was taking pot shots at the squirrels with, I tried to lengthen my stride to keep up with Jesse. He moved, as might be expected, with a slinky sort of Indian walk, making hardly a sound, his head erect and turning periodically from right to left and back again. Once I heard his low-throated chuckle, and ran to ask what he was laughing at. He stopped in the footpath and pointed across the ravine.

It was Mrs. Pierson, Lady's next-door neighbor, having a fall walk in the woods, but in such a way: done up in a fur coat, a turban, with gloves and thin shoes, as if she were going upstreet shopping, her fingers toying with a cigarette, and laughing, who knew at what? She disappeared immediately, and Jesse, still amused, sat down on a sawed-off tree trunk.

"Lordy, white folks." He removed his plaid hunter's cap and ran his hand over his shiny brow. "Sure do funny things."

"White folks?"

"Yes, sir."

I nodded. "Yes, sir."

He laughed again, and gave my shoulder a little punch, and our looks connected. His humor held for a moment, then by degrees disappeared, his expression becoming Jesse-still and sober.

"Jesse," I said.

"Yes, sir," he said, the "sir" a kind of imitation of mine to him.

"Are we friends?"

"I guess if we thought it over, we are."

He bent to tighten one bootlace and I looked at the top of his woolly head for a moment, then said: "Jesse?"

"Mm-hm?" He was still fiddling with the lace.

"Is Lady -- Mrs. Harleigh -- in trouble with someone?"

"Not that I know of." Head still down, he hunched his shoulders once or twice. "You think she might be?"

"There's a man. He comes around sometimes. Lady -- Mrs. Harleigh, she's scared of him."

He raised his head and his eyes looked into mine again. "What man?"

"We don't know who he is. He comes around and -- he's been to her house. He's got a briefcase and --"

"Lawyer?" I could tell from his look that inside that dark head he was doing heavy calculating.

"I don't know. She wouldn't say. I don't think he's her lawyer."

"What's his name?"

"Ott. Mr. Ott-O-T-T. He's got red hair. . . ."

Jesse's arms had shot out and his fingers curled around my elbows, pulling me to him. I could smell the bay rum and the life-saver scent on his breath.

"Red hair, you say?"

"Yes, sir. He's been twice, and this time makes the third."

"Which time?" His eyes narrowed so only the dark parts showed.

"Last Friday night." I related the incident at the drugstore after dancing school. Jesse held me firmly for several moments, thinking, then released me, staring at his mushroom-colored palms. He made a little sound in his throat, as if to clear it, shot me an appraising look, and dropped his glance again.

I looked at him, then down at his shirt buttons, not knowing what to say. His fingers moved to my shoulder and he tapped it ruminatively, as if he, too, didn't know what to say, either about Mr. Ott or about my knowing about him.

"Who else knows?"

I wanted to say no one did, that the secret was between us, only it wasn't. We all knew, Lew and Harry, and Ag, whom we'd thought it right to tell. "But they won't say anything, honest. They'd go to their graves before they'd --"

"If he comes back again" -- Jesse's voice was soft and low, but with the cut of steel -- "if you ever see him around here again, I want you to come and find me. Find me wherever I am, and tell me -- can you do that?"

"Sure, we can do that."

"If he comes and then tries to go away, you've got to make up some story to keep him around till I get there, you understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"And you don't say anything to Missus or Elthea. You don't tell them you told me, understand?"

"Yes, sir."

"Good boy. Let's go along."

"But who is he? Why's he frightening her? What's he want?"

"Did you ask Missus?" he replied evasively.

"I asked her, and she -- she didn't say anything, she wouldn't tell."

"Reckon she wouldn't."

"He's bad, isn't he?"

"Bad? Who can say what's bad, son?" His voice was husky but gentle as he rose from the stump, seeming taller than ever as he hung the shotgun in the crook of his arm. "Still, I guess a fellow who comes around and bothers the lady of the house, yes, you could say he's bad."

He went off down the path, and I followed. A little way along I heard a familiar whistle: it was Blue Ferguson with his rifle. He'd been out hunting, too, but when we all got home none of us had shot anything, except Rabbit, who had knocked off two squirrels with his slingshot. Leave it to Rabbit.

Before bedtime I got Lew and Harry alone and informed them of what Jesse had told me that afternoon, that if Mr. Ott showed up again we were to detain him until we'd gotten word to Jesse, This required further examination, and Harry brought Ag in and we put our heads together, evolving various stratagems to work under a variety of circumstances during which we would attack, tie up, and otherwise impede the intruder if and when he came.

We didn't have long to wait, for he returned on the following Thursday, which was Halloween night and, as it happened, Jesse and Elthea's day off. We'd been down in Lady's cellar helping Jesse paint the storm windows. For whatever reason, Lady had been especially nervous and jumpy during the past few days, and it occurred to me that she might have known about Mr. Ott's earlier visit, or that in her sensitive way she was somehow anticipating it. In any case, Elthea had cautioned us to move quietly downstairs and not make unnecessary disturbances. These admonitions I had momentarily forgotten as, continuing the painting work, I began singing. There was a rhyme we sometimes sang, and it went:

There was an old, old, old, old lady,
And a boy that was half-past three;
And the way that they played together
Was beautiful to see.

We'd put a tune to it, and it caught Gon among all of us, but today I saw Jesse giving me one of his dark looks.

"Don't sing that -- Missus might hear."

I clammed up immediately. Still, I thought, why would such lines bother Lady, and while the words "old, old, old, old lady" kept going through my mind, I thought I had made the connection. She never liked the thought of growing old; it seemed to preoccupy her unnaturally.

We'd gotten almost to the bottom of the can of green enamel when Jesse discovered there wasn't enough to finish the job, so we decided to go to the hardware store. As we were turpentining our hands, a window banged open and a strange, grimy face appeared. "Say, ain't you got your own coal chute down here? Boss says you do."

It was a coal man, come to deliver; his boss was right. Typically, Lady had her own chute, which swung down on iron hooks from the ceiling beams. Jesse went to undo the latch and lower it in place under the window while we all trotted up the hatchway stairs and around front to watch the work.